Wednesday, July 02, 2014

Tea People

As butterflies dance around each other,
so too do people get to know tea. Sometimes they are dancing around
tea, but they haven't yet been made the connection. The greatness of
tea is still outside of their awareness. There is a special kind of
tea person: the tea person who is a tea person before they even know
they are a tea person. We can call them a latent tea person. A person
who loves tea, but does not yet know they love the tea. This is
mostly because they have either not had the right kind of tea, a good
tea, or they have not had tea presented in a way that makes them fall
in love with the tea. But once they experience the right tea in the
right setting, that is just what happens, they fall... and fall hard,
deep into the world of tea. They are different than the average
person who gets into tea, because when they do, it's as if they have
just met a long lost friend. There is no doubt for them that tea fits
into their life. They know they will be enjoying high quality tea
from that moment when they first experience it until they are no
longer with us, here on this earth.

It's funny, after being in the tea
business for a while, I can practically smell a tea person, even a
tea person who does not yet know they are a tea person. I can almost
tell by looking at them, and observing the way that they hold
themselves. But then after talking with them for a bit, I can be 90
percent sure if they are a tea person or not. What are some common
characteristics of a tea person? They like to travel to distant lands
and learn about cultures that are very different from their own. They
might be a food person, or a wine person. They are generally into
expansive thinking and view the world through a positive framework.
They are very often intellectual and exploratory in their thinking,
meaning that they want to learn how to view the world and their place
in the world in a positive light. Sometimes people are into tea for
their own reasons. I once had a customer tell me that he drinks tea
because he doesn't eat vegetables. Thus, a tea drinker is a tea
drinker, but they might not be a tea person.